County releases video footage of escape attempt

CNJ photo A surveillance video released by the Curry County Sheriff shows four inmates rampaging through the jail on Feb. 21. Jail officials estimate the inmates did $15,000 worth of damage.

By Sharna Johnson: CNJ staff writer

A surveillance video released by the Curry County Sheriff shows four inmates rampaging through the jail, taking turns trying to smash through a glass visitation window Feb. 21 during a failed escape attempt.

The video was released at the request of the Clovis News Journal.

In the video, the four men — Guadalupe Urquizo, 29, Brandon Wagner, 24, Rico Sena, 22, and Michael Padilla, 26 — can be seen climbing through a hole in a cell wall, then chasing after and throwing a cooler full of liquid at a startled detention officer in a hallway.

Urquizo was armed with a handmade knife at the time of the confrontation in the hallway, investigators said.

The detention officer confronted by inmates in the hall fled to a control room where he used a telephone to call for help.

Officers entered the building and found the four inmates in two control rooms used to monitor pods.

The video shows officers subduing inmates without incident a few minutes later and regaining control of the jail.

Investigators say the four busted holes through the cinderblock walls of three isolation cells with a metal desk they ripped off a wall.

The same desk was later used to fracture the window in the visitation room.

The four can later be seen in the visitation room trying to break through a window, then ripping lights from the ceiling when the window held.

The cost of the damages, which Waller said have been repaired, is estimated at about $15,000.

A subsequent investigation revealed there were only two detention officers monitoring inmates at the time of the escape attempt. Sheriff Matt Murray also said jail staff were overworked and under-trained.

Murray stepped in and took command after the escape attempt led to the resignation of then-Interim Administrator Carlos Ortiz and several members of his command staff.

Murray said the facility is running smoothly a little more than three months later.

Staffing is improving, he said, with only five detention officer vacancies compared to nine at the time of the incident.